granny saved me

My first race,did my mental preparation, some mechanical prep as well, same tyres i usually ride with, and took off in the third pack.Two hundred metres in , put the glasses away,useless, one kay in , sympathy for the guy with a broken chain, then a guy with a flat ....poor dudes. 'dont go too hard ' i keep reminding myself,...sweatin like demon,remove rain jacket hood, that's better,tractor up hills applauding my decision to run low tyre pressures, cruising past lots of people walking up hills, into majura and it's on the brakes to stay behind the pack,damn! wished i could be overtaking more of them, what's that noise,shit, chain suck, always on muddy days.....damn you wet chain ! brain stars working out how to avoid this, granny ring seems to work well , hmmm only 12 k's into it.....through more majura and glad i went for my flat pedals in the wet, so many guys gone arse up around me,confidence is high. Motor on and remember what my girlfriend tells me, eat at 'x amount of kays , so i do , ...damn gotta piss, do i stop or do it in my pants, no-one will notice, ok, i stopped,i did ! ....soooo wet and muddy, the brakes sound like a lathe slowly depriving me of my new brake pads, leaving the resin pads in the paddocks of canberra. Make sure i say hi and thank the volunteers as i ride past. So many riders being miserable , i laugh inside constantly. Yep it's still raining, somewhere under me and all the mud is a bike that hates me by now, keep pedalling, the mud in that pine forrest section is so deep and slippery, i sympathise for the guys in the 100k, man theyre gonna hate us,i pedal past too many victims of the mud and elements, 32k station and guys are washing their bike with drinking water tap, man i wanna put a stick into their spokes, i eat more cake my girl made me, granny is grinding away most of the time , middle ring sometimes if it dont suck the chain. Stromlo in sight, the heart rate increases, the smile widens as i know this is what i psyched for, yay, i overtake that chick who got me ages ago and the ego is in tact, many a young guy lets me past in defeat up the hill, finally at the top and gravity teams up with me, and it's let go of my null and void brakes ,only one guy in front of me , damn if i could get past, a tight switch back and he messes up , goes over the bars , ugly, he's ok, lets rock, woo hoo i holler as my practice comes into play, the last descent is just joyous, what a scream,....i get to the bottom and make my way to the end and my girl in sight....i f*%#in' did it...my first 50k race, Thanks for gettin me home granny. 3hrs 40min...veterans.....vc